Periodic Reporting for period 2 - COACH (Collaborative Agri-food Chains: Driving Innovation in Territorial Food Systems and Improving Outcomes for Producers and Consumers)
Reporting period: 2022-05-01 to 2023-10-31
Small-scale farmers and food producers are often in a weak position in the value chain. They lack bargaining power, face barriers to accessing markets, and struggle to achieve a fair income. At the same time, due to growing public awareness of the environmental crisis, and the rise of diet-related ill-health, many consumers want to conveniently access high quality, healthy and sustainable foods. Within this context, COACH has facilitated collaboration between farmers, consumers, local governments and other actors to ‘scale up’ short agri-food chains. These aim to rebalance farmers’ position, create win-wins for producers and consumers and drive innovation in territorial food systems.
The project had 5 objectives. First, it developed a ‘Living Library’ of 34 emblematic good practice examples – or ‘beacons’ - demonstrating how farmers can access consumer-driven opportunities to improve their incomes and rebalance their position in food chains. Second, it delivered a knowledge-based suite of activities to support farmers and small operators to access information on consumer demand and improve their capacity to connect with consumers. Third, it provided new insights and guidance on the costs and margins for each link in the supply chain, demonstrating opportunities for improved incomes for farmers and small operators and reduced costs for intermediaries. Fourth, it designed a ‘farm-to-fork procurement toolkit’ for public authorities to improve sharing of experience and help them design appropriate tenders for healthy and fresh food supplied by small-scale producers. Fifth, it maximised the impact of the project’s activities through effective communication and dissemination including policy engagement to create a more enabling environment for collaborative agri-food chains.
The project had 5 objectives. First, it developed a ‘Living Library’ of 34 emblematic good practice examples – or ‘beacons’ - demonstrating how farmers can access consumer-driven opportunities to improve their incomes and rebalance their position in food chains. Second, it delivered a knowledge-based suite of activities to support farmers and small operators to access information on consumer demand and improve their capacity to connect with consumers. Third, it provided new insights and guidance on the costs and margins for each link in the supply chain, demonstrating opportunities for improved incomes for farmers and small operators and reduced costs for intermediaries. Fourth, it designed a ‘farm-to-fork procurement toolkit’ for public authorities to improve sharing of experience and help them design appropriate tenders for healthy and fresh food supplied by small-scale producers. Fifth, it maximised the impact of the project’s activities through effective communication and dissemination including policy engagement to create a more enabling environment for collaborative agri-food chains.
The Living Library hosts 34 emblematic good practice case studies, known as ‘beacons’. Users can search the library to find real world examples of short food chains, civic food initiatives and public procurement initiatives. They can search thematically, according to different ‘spotlight’ topics such as ‘innovative governance’ or ‘equity and accessibility’.
Our knowledge-based suite of activities to support small-scale farmers and improve their capacity to connect with consumers included an ‘International Knowledge Exchange’ (IKE) bringing together all the consortium partners and many of our beacons to share knowledge and experience.
We also ran 11 multi-actor dialogue (MAD) events involving almost 600 people to enable small-scale farmers and food businesses, civic food networks and state actors and to jointly produce local roadmaps for activities supporting the development of collaborative, short agri-food chains. Seven training events, (3 national and 4 European), reaching around 550 participants were organized.
At the national events the topics included: strategies to manage small and medium-sized farms in a way that allows producers to have fair earnings, different approaches to marketing and sales, including online shops, farm shops, farmers markets, cooperatives, box schemes and Community Supported Agriculture schemes across different farm systems, and smart innovation relating to online ordering, logistics and distribution.
The European training events covered value chain development and consumer driven opportunities in alternative grain economies, understanding costs and margins in short food supply chains, smart innovation for small-scale producers assessing markets in the public sector and farm-to-fork procurement. The materials from the European training events are freely available on our Territorial Food Systems Hub. To further support capacity building we ran a peer-to-peer coaching and mentoring.
The project also contributed to 3 consumer events: a bread festival in Georgia; a land skills fair in UK and a public symposium on CSAs in Germany. We also developed a novel methodology to measure economic and non-economic costs and margins for different actors in the value chain. Analysis showed that, by participating in collaborative short food chains, producers can achieve more stable and direct relationships with consumers. Whilst they often command higher prices for their products, they also have additional costs to cover, such as labour, transport/logistics, processing and marketing. Another key output is our comprehensive farm-to-fork toolkit. It offers practical legal advice to public procurers and stakeholders interested in connecting public food procurement with small-scale farmers and SMEs.
The toolkit provides insights into making tender processes more accessible to SMEs and farmers, covering topics ranging from legal considerations for tenders below thresholds to criteria for tenders above thresholds, and innovative approaches like ‘Dynamic Food Procurement.’ The document has been published on our Territorial Food Systems Hub and on the ICLEI CityFood program website. Finally, we employed a range of communication tools including 5 short videos showcasing different themes in collaborative short food supply chains, 1 public procurement animation, 4 articles in specialised practitioner magazines, 5 policy briefings, 25 practice abstracts, 1 academic journal paper (with more forthcoming), and at least 14 international policy engagement events.
Our knowledge-based suite of activities to support small-scale farmers and improve their capacity to connect with consumers included an ‘International Knowledge Exchange’ (IKE) bringing together all the consortium partners and many of our beacons to share knowledge and experience.
We also ran 11 multi-actor dialogue (MAD) events involving almost 600 people to enable small-scale farmers and food businesses, civic food networks and state actors and to jointly produce local roadmaps for activities supporting the development of collaborative, short agri-food chains. Seven training events, (3 national and 4 European), reaching around 550 participants were organized.
At the national events the topics included: strategies to manage small and medium-sized farms in a way that allows producers to have fair earnings, different approaches to marketing and sales, including online shops, farm shops, farmers markets, cooperatives, box schemes and Community Supported Agriculture schemes across different farm systems, and smart innovation relating to online ordering, logistics and distribution.
The European training events covered value chain development and consumer driven opportunities in alternative grain economies, understanding costs and margins in short food supply chains, smart innovation for small-scale producers assessing markets in the public sector and farm-to-fork procurement. The materials from the European training events are freely available on our Territorial Food Systems Hub. To further support capacity building we ran a peer-to-peer coaching and mentoring.
The project also contributed to 3 consumer events: a bread festival in Georgia; a land skills fair in UK and a public symposium on CSAs in Germany. We also developed a novel methodology to measure economic and non-economic costs and margins for different actors in the value chain. Analysis showed that, by participating in collaborative short food chains, producers can achieve more stable and direct relationships with consumers. Whilst they often command higher prices for their products, they also have additional costs to cover, such as labour, transport/logistics, processing and marketing. Another key output is our comprehensive farm-to-fork toolkit. It offers practical legal advice to public procurers and stakeholders interested in connecting public food procurement with small-scale farmers and SMEs.
The toolkit provides insights into making tender processes more accessible to SMEs and farmers, covering topics ranging from legal considerations for tenders below thresholds to criteria for tenders above thresholds, and innovative approaches like ‘Dynamic Food Procurement.’ The document has been published on our Territorial Food Systems Hub and on the ICLEI CityFood program website. Finally, we employed a range of communication tools including 5 short videos showcasing different themes in collaborative short food supply chains, 1 public procurement animation, 4 articles in specialised practitioner magazines, 5 policy briefings, 25 practice abstracts, 1 academic journal paper (with more forthcoming), and at least 14 international policy engagement events.
COACH has progressed beyond the start of the art by delivering results and impact in three key areas. First, by developing tailor-made and practical support to set up innovative supply chains.
Our Living Library provides good practice examples, but importantly, also illustrates challenges and shares stories of innovation. In terms of our ways of working, our beacons were not ‘passive’ case studies, but active participants which means that the results of the project are tailor-made to the needs of actors working to develop collaborative short food chains. Moreover, our bespoke coaching and mentoring programme supported beacons to address self-defined goals relating to setting up innovative supply chains. We hope it will provide an important model of knowledge exchange and personal growth which is highly relevant to the question of ‘scaling up/out’ short food chains.
Secondly, in ‘Integrating the needs of primary producers and consumers in a hands-on approach in particular by minimising margins taken by intermediaries’ the COACH project successfully delivered activities intended to give guidance on the costs and margins for farmers and small operators. This included an online self-assessment tool developed in collaboration with farmers and small operators, a learning module, and a European training event attended by 35 participants. Participants identified key benefits including increased confidence in measuring the sustainability value of their work, the need for deeper collaboration, and to rethink their marketing approaches.
Thirdly to ‘Improve sharing of experience between contracting authorities on tendering healthy and fresh food’ - the COACH project delivered a series of high impact events and materials including two training events (involving over 200 participants) and a ‘farm to fork public procurement toolkit’ a legal guide for food procurers. Of particular note was the impact of the training on participants, many of whom urgently needed guidance on this emerging and important area and indicated they would go on to engage in sustainable public procurement activities in their own context.
Our Living Library provides good practice examples, but importantly, also illustrates challenges and shares stories of innovation. In terms of our ways of working, our beacons were not ‘passive’ case studies, but active participants which means that the results of the project are tailor-made to the needs of actors working to develop collaborative short food chains. Moreover, our bespoke coaching and mentoring programme supported beacons to address self-defined goals relating to setting up innovative supply chains. We hope it will provide an important model of knowledge exchange and personal growth which is highly relevant to the question of ‘scaling up/out’ short food chains.
Secondly, in ‘Integrating the needs of primary producers and consumers in a hands-on approach in particular by minimising margins taken by intermediaries’ the COACH project successfully delivered activities intended to give guidance on the costs and margins for farmers and small operators. This included an online self-assessment tool developed in collaboration with farmers and small operators, a learning module, and a European training event attended by 35 participants. Participants identified key benefits including increased confidence in measuring the sustainability value of their work, the need for deeper collaboration, and to rethink their marketing approaches.
Thirdly to ‘Improve sharing of experience between contracting authorities on tendering healthy and fresh food’ - the COACH project delivered a series of high impact events and materials including two training events (involving over 200 participants) and a ‘farm to fork public procurement toolkit’ a legal guide for food procurers. Of particular note was the impact of the training on participants, many of whom urgently needed guidance on this emerging and important area and indicated they would go on to engage in sustainable public procurement activities in their own context.